Those Moments of Dawning
by Taokan
Summary: A series of self indulgent and mostly unconnected drabbles spanning long nights and longer days in the lives of the Hawke siblings. Some chapters will be Bethany/Garret, some Bethany/Carver, some Bethany/Carver/Garret. These are transcribed directly from my tumblr, and so quite often open as stream of consciousness, which I hope you'll excuse.
1. Chapter 1

Sometimes I'll be sitting there minding my own business and be overcome with a sudden raw, visceral need to see Bethany and Garret Hawke in a loose limbed sprawl, slick fingers trailing lazy paths across skin, across slopes and angles and shadows, exploring with the softest of touches places he already knew by heart, places that made her suck in a breath between her teeth, made her head loll back and her skin tingle and flash beneath his hands, beneath his heated gaze and his panted breaths and bean early him until she could barely stay still, until she had to touch him, had to press herself against him, press him back against the wall, tilting his head up and back with her chin to close an open mouthed kiss against his throat, her thoughts crowding on the edge of her tongue until she hardly knew which way was up or down or anything but where he was, where they met and drew apart and where his fingers pressed still against her, and she clutched at him, at those seconds spinning away between her fingers, near breathless with that heady mix of anticipation and desire and need and guilt, always ever guilt. She still couldn't quite bring herself to believe that she could touch him whenever she wanted, that he'd let her, that he wanted her to. That his face darkened with anything but disgust when she reached for him in the dark, hesitant at first but with growing confidence. The knowledge was settling in at the back of her brain more and more every passing day, but.

Still.

Still, sometimes that first guilty flush of shameful desire dragged icy fingers up her throat knuckle by knuckle until she shivered, until she choked, until she had to turn her head to press against the hollow of his throat to hide her eyes because she wanted to, because she could look at her older brother and feel these things, these urges, could feel her eyes slipping down to linger at his collarbone, his lips, the arch of a hip and feel anything but, at worst, a platonic admiration for how well he took care of himself, a distant, cool appraisal, where she only wanted to skip her hands beneath the folds of his shirt and count his ribs with her fingers, her mouth, whisper broken praises against his skin that she'd only ever pressed into her bottom lip with teeth that wanted only to close around his ear, his fingers, his everything.

Her face grew hot, and she turned her cheek to the shadow beneath his chin. He smelled like salt and skin and sex and that musky tang that sat heavy on her tongue and made her hips twitch restlessly until she forced them still.

His hands came up almost despite themselves to settle on her hips. He didn't grip so much as let them fall to line up with the faint pattern of brushing that rose in dusky reminder of what they'd just been doing, what she'd been doing, and she had to repress another shiver that turned sweet at the gentle pressure of fingers up the valleys and peaks of her spine, at the warm pass of his lips against her temple. Then he fell still, motionless except for the steady bellows of his chest against hers until her breathing slowed, steadied to match his, until she pulled back to look him in the eye, and what she saw there nearly made her turn her face from him again, it was too much, too steady and open and too, too much for her to bear. Almost. Because she couldn't be afraid of him, not really. Beneath that small, ringing voice shrill in her head that sounded like anxiety and felt like the first numbing pass of grief was warmth. Was the memory of this same, slow crooked smile peering at her between father's legs, steadying her, giving her something to brace herself against, to shore herself up when all the world trembled breath them.

She settled back on his lap without thought, expecting and finding that hand at her back, keeping her from falling. He still hasn't said a word, not since her sighed her name in the moment of his end. He was waiting for her lead, giving her the time to come to some sort of a decision, as he always had. Her brother was a natural leader, had raised her with a clasped finger around hers in the dark from the time when she was very small and had needed someone to, needed a voice and an arm to tell her what to do, but that time had passed. He let her make the decisions here. He seemed relieved, most times, to fall back against her wishes, let someone else lead, and there was something there, something that she knew was large and cracked and shifting with a restless groan beneath her gaze, something she'd started to notice, to pry out piece by piece in these last days. The first had been when he'd placed his wrists inside the close of her hands, and this look on his face was one other, was something new and something so old it made her chest feel tight. "I'm all right," she told him softly, breath warm against his skin as she shifted in his lap to press back against him. She felt that desire low in her belly but it had cooled somewhat, now, and she only made the smallest of noises when the length of him settled firmly between the v of her legs. He was half-hard, and she could feel him stirring, but he only looked at her and raised a hand to trace the curl if a damp curl against her brow. Bethany leaned into the touch, offering him a reassuring smile that only shook a little. "It still seems a dream," she told his brow, the furrows between where careworn lines carved themselves before her eyes, settling only at the press of her lips there, and here, at the corner of his eye, his cheek, his nose. "I-" She swallowed, hard. These next words were an effort. "I keep expecting all this to be a dream, or a, a mistake." He went still beneath her, but she pressed on, because if she stopped she'd never be able to start again. She couldn't quite look him in the eye. "For you to look at me the way the chantry sisters look whenever they speak of mages. You should. I ought to be ashamed, to bring myself before mother and beg forgiveness but I can't." She dared to look at him, and his eyes, so like father's, and was caught. Held. She could barely find the breath to get the next words out. "I can't, and I can't bring myself to be sorry, either." The words started off small, but grew in strength as she said them, until she was straightening, drawing herself up until her head was nearly even with his, and that didn't matter, never had, because he was looking at her the same way he'd used to look at father, at the sudden crash and fall of thunder before lightning and fire spat out in a wash of color and light, the way, she slowly realized, her always looked at her. "This is true, as real, as vital as the stones beneath our feet, and I can't, I can't bring myself to regret something that makes look at you, at all the tomorrow's with hope, I'm sorry, I-"  
Garret's mouth was moving soundlessly. He looked like all the strength had left his limbs. His hands shook as they rose up to cradle her face, and she knew now that that curl in her belly was something much greater than she'd thought it was, thought she was, and fell herself falling without his hand ever once leaving her back, ever once leaving her.


	2. Chapter 2

So I woke up a little early with my head pounding and a bad taste in my mouth and decided to make myself feel better by imagining Bethany Hawke stretched out flush against Garret's back, rubbing soothing circles on his temples with cool fingers. Pressing lingering kisses to his neck that start of warm, and after she pulls away there is a curling fern of frost left behind that spreads across heated skin, bringing a sigh and a gradual release of the tension built up in the muscles of his back. Of her lips curving up into a smile when he starts to feel better, starts to gradually become aware of his very naked sister pressed against him, and the very interesting things she's doing with her hips without barely living at all. Of Bethany cap putting his hands in hers and bring them up to catch at the bedposts before drawing hers back down the length of his torso to trace teasing fingers against the place where his legs join up with his hips, that delicious little V that disappears into the coverlets. He moves to lift his hips to give her getter access but she won't let him, not at first, just touches light fingers here, there, licking and nibbling and catching the shell of his ear between her teeth in a way that makes him shiver and grind against the mattress, makes her him approvingly, but she still won't release him, still won't let him turn over or touch him in the way he wants to be touched, needs to be touched. A whine catches in his throat, dies spent on his tongue when a slim hand falls to cup his buttocks, to spread and palm them, to slip a finger between his cheeks and press the barest pressure against his opening and he can feel his eyes roll back in his head he's trying so hard to be still, to be quiet, but she wants him to do the exact opposite. So she teases. She licks tingling trails down those sensitive areas with hands that spark and leap with balls of light. That catch at his throat and press just so, angling his head back and applying pressure in a way that makes him finally release that groan she wanted all along, and then she's moving and he and she and they are rolling over in a tangle of limbs and hair and laughter and he quite forgets all about his head in favor of the other one, of her.


	3. Chapter 3

Sometimes I like to think of the Hawke siblings tangled up together in a single corn shuck mattress, heads pillowed on shoulders, arms going numb, somebody drooling on somebody else and always, somebody stealing the covers from Carver.

And then other times I devote a great deal of brainpower to who Bethany is rubbing herself up against, who's got their hands gripping her leg, lifting it up so they can slide in her pussy together, Bethany's head falling back against their shoulder with an open mouthed sigh that got lost somewhere along the way and became this strangled thing, half shout half moan, reaching behind her to tangle her fingers in their hair to brace herself while two pairs of hands grip tight on her hips, slamming into her, and I got lost again because I'm a giant pervert.


	4. Chapter 4

Sometimes it helps me feel better to imagine Bethany and Carver gathering herbs together in the slow liquid wash of the afternoon, Bethany peeking up at him through lowered eyes, mapping out the deep furrows and canyons dig between his brows.

She'd left him to go train with father and Garret again today. He tried not to make his disappointment obvious, but Bethany was too familiar with his moods. She'd read it on his face the second she'd walked through the front door to find him cooking with mother, or attempting to. He'd been beating the bread dough with a tad too much enthusiasm, the muscles standing out on his shoulders. She'd taken one look at him and announced that they had to go gather herbs while it was still light out enough to do so.  
She looked up at him now and couldn't help reaching over to tap the spot between his eyes, or the smile that stole across her features when he blinked at her. "You're thinking again," she teased gently, then, more seriously, "You know you could come with us. You could help. Father said we should learn how to work together in a fight with people that can't cast magic, if we have to. I'd really like it if you came," she added quietly, ducking her head a little bit with a small smile that lingered in the corner of her mouth.  
Carver's eyes flickered there, and away. "What about Garret?" His voice was raspy, and slow, as if pulled from him. "You're already practicing with him anyway." He looked down and away at that, and she knew at once that he'd seen them practice more than magic together.

Bethany was quiet for a moment, long enough that Carver looked back at her without moving his head. Moving slowly, with a care she took with those things most precious to her, Bethany cupped his cheek, thumb sliding down to trace the dimple she shared with him. "You haven't seen your smile," she said, kissing the spot warmed by her fingers and just beside it, feeling his lips curve against hers despite himself. "I've tried to learn it, but every time all I can see is stars."

He snorted at that, but relaxed nonetheless, lips softening beneath hers, parting with a soft sigh as he released the breath he'd been holding. "Stars? Really. If you talk about the sun next I'm leaving." He didn't pull away, though, in fact he leaned closer, turning his head into her touch. Bethany spread her fingers and ran them up the sharp line of his cheek and into his hair, giving a sharp tug to bare his throat.

"Maybe not the sun, but you don't need magic to burn," she said just before she pressed an open mouthed kiss to the pulse point in his throat, feeling the stuttering leap beneath the pass of her lips and teeth and to hue, the basket falling down, forgotten, from trembling hands that rose to tangle in the fall of her hair.


	5. Chapter 5

Carver doesn't remember the first time he kissed her but he does remember the first time she kissed him. The taste of her smile sat heavy on his tongue, and she chased it, swallowed his gasp down and replaced it with her breath, her sighs, taking all his air and giving nothing back, giving everything back.  
His hands hung uselessly at his sides, clenching and unclenching. He didn't know where to put them, what to do with himself. Bethany had no such problems. Her hands skated across his chest, his face, getting tangled in his hair where they gripped and tugged and pulled him down for better access.  
Her eyes were open and locked on his, not wanting to miss the way his pupils blew wide and open and endless, the catch in his breath that made his chest brush against hers, made her want to shift closer, want to press herself flush against him. But she was only fourteen years old and her every nerve sang with conflicting urges to crawl inside his lap and to pull away. Her breath stuttered. She tightened her grip for a second before release, pulling back just enough they brushed noses. They were both panting, breathless and smiling and staring, and she felt like she could take to the sky and fly if only he kept looking at her like that.

Carver didn't remember the first time he kissed her, but he remembered the first time Bethany seared him with a fire of her own making.


	6. Chapter 6

I find myself increasingly distracted by the idea of Bethany getting tattoos, most especially tattoos given by Garret. By Garret straddling her back, legs wrapped tight around her hips, working in silence, in song, occasionally wiping excess blood and ink away with a hand that lingered in the shadow of her skin, mapping the topography of sound. What brought forth a sigh, a twisting shift that brought her hands up to grip the sheets, grip him, a hum that resonated straight through him and made him pause, made him fold over her back without a sound, breathing raggedly through his nose in an attempt to keep still, to keep himself from touching her. He failed, as he always did when it came to his sister.

Tossed the gun aside to catch her up in his arms, bring her flush against his chest so he could touch and be touched, Bethany's head falling back against his shoulder with a breathless little laugh that went straight to his cock and made him bury his face against the damp of her skin with a groan, catching up handfuls of her and brushing, rubbing with the calloused pads of his thumbs places that made her arch, made her trail off into short little catches if breath that pulled at him, compelled him to tug her around for a kiss that felt so good it almost pained him. Bethany reached up and twisted her fingers deep in his hair, wringing forth a sound that made her smile, made her twist and arm between them to shove him down. Now it was her turn to settle across his hips, making herself comfortable with a little sigh that made him reach for her. She batted his hands away with a swiftness belief by her smile, pushed them down over his head. "Let's see what you've got written in between your lines," she murmured against his mouth.


	7. Chapter 7

The webcam gave a jerk and swung wide in a confusion of colors before settling on the underside of Bethany's face. Her face remained out of focus for a moment, blurred and scraping by with an after wash of pixels the color of her hair, her eyes, that stained the screen and burst across the back of his eyes in ways that hurt, down in the bottom of his belly where everything good sprung. The webcam whirred and spun and resettled over the curve of Bethany's chin, bringing her into sharp relief just as she drew in her bottom lip between her teeth, pulling Garret's eyes helplessly after. "Um." Ten miles and a world away, his little sister touched the barest fingertip to the darkened places on her lip with a breathless little laugh. "Oh, this is stupid, Garret, I feel-" She caught herself before going on, spots of color blooming high on her cheeks as she ducked her head down into the collar of his borrowed shirt. "I feel like a perv," she said, her voice dropping to a whisper, and Garret had to laugh. He didn't mean to, but he couldn't help it either, no more than he could help the restless curl of fisted hands that itched to close around her cheek where her smile lay buried in a dimple.

"That's because you are," Garret told her solemnly, surprising a shout of laughter out of her.

"It was your idea!" She cried in mock outrage, or tried to, but a few escaped giggles gave her away. "You snuck in the webcam and everything! You said-"

"Shame!" He boomed, and Bethany bumped against her webcam with a squeak, rushing to turn down the volume on her computer.

"Garret-!"

"Shame! Your wicked perversions matched only by the most depraved of adult erotica-"

"You mean the kind you read to me before bed?"

"-have turned an inccocent, wholly virginal," Bethany greeted this idea with a snort, "man in the flower of his youth to shamelessly parade himself before you. You, you lech!"

"You've still got all your clothes on," Bethany pointed out with an arch little toss of her head that sent her her hair tumbling over her shoulders in a wave. "If I knew your parade would have been this much of a disappointment I might have gone to take a nap instead."

"Like your dreams could ever match up to this," Garret drawled, drawing the pad of his thumb down to circle his nipple with an exaggerated pout that had Bethany in stitches. "Now," he said, then, drawing himself up so Bethany could see the slow quirk of his smile under eyes gone half-lidded and heated. "Did you wear it like I asked you?"

Bethany averted her eyes down and to the right with a small noise that passed between pressed lips and straight to Garret's cock. He pressed the heel of his hand into it and ground down, smothering the whine building up in his throat when his sister gave a little bobbing nod and shifted, jarring the camera. The image wavered and scattered into boxes and abstract angled colors, but he could make out the lagging dip of her arm between the sea of rising shadows at her thighs, tugging aside scratchy lines that may have been her underwear to show a flash of pink that he recognized as the end of a dildo where it disappeared between her legs. "Did you?"

Garret let his smirk answer for him. Grabbing up the webcam from its stand, he lifted up his hips and angled the webcam. In the tiny square in the corner of the screen that showed what Bethany was seeing, he could see the muted sheen of metal curved to vanish up his ass. Even that movement was enough to make stars explode across his eyes, eroding the last of his carefully maintained control in soft rippling waves. Garret sucked in his breath between his teeth with a soft hiss as he sank back down on the chair, driving the dildo just that little bit deeper. He bit back a whine.

"That's real pretty," he heard Bethany say. He opened his eyes to see her watching him with that particular intent, hungry expression that made his mouth go dry. "Move it," she told him, and softer, so soft he barely heard it, there came wet sounds. Her arm moved in and out of the corner of the frame. "So I can see."

Garret ran his tongue over dry lips -he heard more than saw Bethany's hips arch off her mattress- and started to draw the dildo out with agonizing slowness that made his teeth ache and his cock throb so it almost hurt, only just barely managing to restrain himself from giving in to the urge to go faster because he knew what the sight of the trembling muscles in his legs did to Bethany. In slow increments the dildo slid out to warm the palm of his hand. They both sighed. Through slotted eyes he watched Bethany slide a hand between the folds of his shirt to tease a nipple erect.

He paused a moment to drink that in, and then he was moving, driving the dildo in. "Touch yourself," she said, hushed, and he did, imagining it was Bethany's hand guiding it into him, her hand rising to close around the length of him, squeezing and twisting at the tense in that way that he liked, that Bethany loved, letting his head loll back on the seat cushion. "Faster," she was saying, and if he closed his eyes he could almost see the part of her lips around the shape of a smile across the pillows, the warm pass of her breath into his inner thigh.

She'd gone quiet but he didn't need her to tell him to lift his fingers between his lips to get them wet the way she always did, eyes fluttering closed at the thought, at the sensation, before drawing them down his chest to draw teasing lines up from the base to the tip and back. He didn't bother to hold back the throaty moan it wrung from him, his fingers, his thoughts of Bethany, spread wide and open and ready for him, his fingers smoothing over her mound as hers guided him into her mouth, or the desperate, keening cry that followed. "Oh, fuck, fuck," he babbled, all control of his tongue lost. He said all kinds of things. Beautiful things, duty things, things that were true. Called her his star, his moon on dark water, eager hands and open mouth and smiles, MAKER, that smile-

A pause and a squirt of lotion from the container beneath the desk made his fingers flow smoother, gliding a tightened grip up the slick length of him and back down to release in ways that made his breath catch in his chest. The thought of Bethany's eyes on him was intoxicating, a coil of warmth building up at the core of him that expanded outward and made him bob his hips, made him slide the dildo in and out, faster, harder, driving the air out of him in a rush.

For the space of a breath, a lifetime, filled only with small pants and bigger cracks rending them in two, and then Bethany's breaths came louder, clearer, as she drew her head in closer. "Stop," she said when he was just teetering on the edge of release. Garret whined protest but had already drawn back his hand. Bethany hummed approval, settled back on her blankets. "Move the camera," she told him, "let's see your face."

He took his hand away from himself long enough to do as instructed, and she was smiling, smiling warm and sweet and genuine, and he gasped from a different feeling entirely. "Again."

Again and again she drove him to the brink before pulling him back, for what seemed like hours, until he was near mindless and the only words he could gather up the will to say were "Bethany," and "please," near sobbed, near soundless towards the end, more exhalation than words, and then she was at his ear again, encouraging. Ordering. "Come for me, Garret," she panted, voice gone high and straining with need, near screaming it. "Come now! Now!" He thought he heard Bethany say something else, but he could barely hear her over the rushing roar in his ears. Another few sharp snap of his hips and he was coming.

His vision went white. For long moments all the world narrowed down the the electric snap and burn arcing up his spine, snapping him up and away from the back of his chair with a thin, reedy cry that trailed off into shuddering breaths that left him dizzied and shaking as he sank back.

The webcam had tumbled down into the swell of Bethany's breast where it was bared by the shirt. A sheen of white that must have been sweat arced up to disappear into rounded shadows. He could hear her ragged breathing. The image rose and fell like a ship at sea, giving the briefest of glimpses of the curled shape of Bethany's fingers over the dildo at the crest of each rise before dipping back down to fallen breaths.

After another few moments had passed, the round of Bethany's fingers came into frame. Bethany's breasts fell away, to be replaced with a shakeup smile. When she drew her hand away she left a little smear of moisture behind. "I miss you," she said into the silence, and if her voice was small you couldn't prove it by her smile. He tried to pull his own up, but he could tell by the crack in her voice that he hadn't succeeded. "Maybe. Maybe the Knight Commander will approve the petition this time."

"Yeah," he replied a moment, injecting false cheer into his voice for her sake, though he knew neither of them believed it. "I'm sure she will. I'll be right there waiting for you to return to your room after devotions wearing great big smile." Nothing but," he added, dipping his voice with a suggestive wiggle of his brows and hips, making her laugh a little despite herself. "Just for you."


	8. Chapter 8

There are times I wonder what they'd be like in a modern au, and then I kinda get sidetracked following all the plot threads back to this moment, when Garret asked a question and Bethany couldn't even talk at first, couldn't stand, couldn't breathe anything but the inside if his mouth, fingers scrabbling to brace in his hair at the back of his mouth, inhaling the dizzy rush of stifled moans and wordless pleas until she was dizzy, drunk on them, on him, rocking herself against him until his breath caught on a keening whine, panting against her when she nipped and suckled, cried her name like a prayer in the night when she ripped her mouth away to descend in his neck, gripping him everywhere she could reach with fingers that shook, that spat out dancing crackles of sparks that made him jump, made him laugh until her lips descended on the length of him.

I think about it a lot.


	9. Chapter 9

Maker knew there were days (gone nights gone grey tinged washes of light that spilled down Bethany's skin like water, lapping down her every slope and peaked angle in succession, in a rippling tide that carried with it the detritus of time shared and time grown— a length of cotton knotted still around Garret's wrist, discarded clothes that came unfurled beneath her turns, questing fingers that sought and found those parts of her still limmed in shadow, in textured silences that broke on a shivery sigh that started an avalanche, a gradual fall that tossed the light into the air to be lost, to be found and spread and caught up in Garret's smile, in the hiccuping gasp of a laugh that brightened the room still more) where they could hardly keep their hands off each other, but there were others spent just like this, curled an arm's length apart in the cooling impressions left of the other's body, smiles tucked into the curve of an elbow, into crinkled eyes and in the soft, lingering curve of fingers around fingers, like a kiss. Like a promise.


	10. Chapter 10

#Bethany got up to look at them in the dawning light#they're so still right now#peaceful#not arguing or complaining or joking or fucking but just#breathing#reaching for each other in drowsy want for warmth#pressing their faces into the shadow where the long line of a beared throat meets with the shoulder#and smiles#soaks in the moment#and then she crawls back on the bed between Garret's spread legs and with the lightest of touches rouses them both back to full awareness and the fullest arousal


	11. Chapter 11

Bethany Hawke twining herself around Garret, bring her face up close to his to brush the barest of kisses against his lips, sucking in her lower lip between her teeth when he pressed his weight down against her.

Bethany Hawke carding her hands through Carver's hair, dragging her nails against his scalp to wring out a groan that set her breath to shuddering through her.

Bethany Hawke shifting to brace her arm over Marian's head, exhaling a softened breath as a sigh when Marian touched her just so.


	12. Chapter 12

Bethany Hawke gripping her older brother up in slender hands that fought for purchase against the heft of him, sighing out a word, three, that was swallowed up in the moment of release.


	13. Chapter 13

Carver Hawke dragging the pad of his thumb down over his older sister's lip, exhaling a laugh when she keened, turned a gasp when she nipped at him, drew it in between her lips to pull a slow warmth down his thumb, giving him a smirk from under eyes gone heavy lidded with desire.

Marian Hawke easing the spread of legs gone slick with want with her hands as she sank down inch by inexorable inch on her brother's length, breathing a ragged cry of "yes," and "closer, brother," when he started to move. "Closer."

Carver Hawke licking his way up Marian's chest with deliberate slowness, following a tingling trail set by his hands that had his sister arching and panting his name, gone hoarse with need.

Marian Hawke's hips making restless rhythms against his cock, driving him ever deeper with insistent little jerks, every movement setting stars to bursting across the inside if his eyelids.


	14. Chapter 14

The first few beams of cool grey morning light filtered through the blinds to splash across Bethany's face, oozing with liquid slowness across her eyes.

There came a momentary pause, one filled with softly inheld breath, and then her eyelids flickered and twitched before squeezing tight. Bethany made a small noise in the back of her throat and turned her face into Garret's shoulder with a grumbling groan. She refused to open her eyes this early without due cause, but the slanted fall of light across the pinkened veil of her eyelids told her that it was well after seven, time and past for her brother to be up. "You're late for work," she yawned, twisting a stretch that brought her pressing up against those places that were still warm from her.

"I know." The bristly beginnings of a beard scratched through her hair, something rueful but entirely unlike true concern dripping from his words like the first honey of summer, something slow and spreading and sweet, something that clung to her breath and the curling corners of her mouth that refused to come undone, now. Her fingers. They only tangled further in his hair, tugging him in closer for a kiss, then a second, nibbling and licking a shivery line across his lips until they parted for her with a sound that tasted sweeter still.

Bethany murmured approval and shifted, coming more awake and alert now at the first sweeps of her tongue. She plunged in with a happy sigh, with a purr, with a clenching of her hands and her knees that made his chest hitch against hers, made his breath catch and become lost somewhere between her tongue and her lungs as she breathed him in, all of him, more, all he had to give and more he didn't know he had, until it was his turn to clutch at her, to make simply delicious needy sounds high up in his throat. When she finally let him pull away he was gasping, licking kiss swollen lips with a pink flash of tongue she moved without thought to follow with her own.

He dodged her with a laugh, pulling back just far enough that she was left kissing empty air, smiling down at her. He bumped her nose with his. "Later," he said, though he had the good grace to look regretful. "I'll never get to work if we start that up."

"You wanted to quit anyway," Bethany groaned, rolling over of her side to bring her bent forearm up to shield her eyes enough to look at his backlit face where it tilted to flash an upside down smile at her.

"Maybe, but I want to eat too, and keep you well supplied in candles and lighting, don't I? You aren't a cheap date."

"You're the one who uses up all the soap," she retorted, sticking out her tongue, but she was smiling at she said it, flopping back onto her back with a sigh. She'd have to get up herself in a while, but she was feeling far too warm currently to want to move. Warm in the traces Garret left and with thoughts of him, too, she admitted to herself with the slow, ticklish slide of embarrassment that had her catching at her lower lip with her teeth when she heard the water turn in in the bathroom, her imagination filling in those gaps where her eyes had ever been ready to supply. The slide of his pants down over slim hips, the curve of his spine receding away from his backside that just begged to be traced with hands and lips and teeth, up and up and down again.

Bethany's hips stuttered a tight circle. She fought down a small noise. Even now, that old familiar guilt bloomed heat high on her cheeks, serving only to heighten the excitement than had her pressing her legs together with a noise that was closer to a moan than a whimper when she pressed questing fingers between them, loud and wanton and surprising herself. She thought for a moment that Garret had heard her, but she relaxed back with the warm coil of warmth in her belly as she eased her pajama bottoms aside to grind down her palm to the place that ached.

Bethany let her head fall back on a gasp, fingers curling through damp hair to leave ringing trails that begged for more attention. She gave it to herself, again and again, fingers flickering a staccato rhythm in circles she hadn't even known how to do a few short years ago but that now she would die if she couldn't have it, would fly apart at the seams without something to hold on to. Her breath hitched at the pressure, leaving her all in a rush. Her lip trembled, wringing the last sound out as a whimpering cry, soft and lost in the pounding counterpoint at her ears and the rush of water from the bathroom. Her tongue fair cleaved to the roof of her mouth when the sound of water was replaced with creak of metal on metal and the groan of pipes, with her own groan joining the chorus at the thought of his coming out before she was done, of his finding her here like this.

Her eyes fluttered closed at the mental image such an idea conjured, his calloused palms still wet from the shower cold against her skin, and she let out a shivering sob that soon faded to a shriek at the unexpected pressure of very real and very chill fingers coming down to grip on either thigh. "Oh, I think work might have to wait."


	15. Chapter 15

He'd known to expect the daggers from her letters —the warden commander had insisted mages spend part of their day at weapons training with the rest of the recruits in preparation for the day when her magics might fail her— but he hadn't thought to expect the calluses. The way they bumped and dragged the most delicious friction down his skin, the slightest touch wringing shivering exhales from his mouth like prayers.

His hand had come up to grip her hips quite of their own volition, pulling her snug against the hard length of him. He had to bite back a groan when she twisted to press a kiss to his temple, a movement that rubbed her against him in a way he found very interesting, and very very frustrating. Bethany was still fully clothed, and it was driving him mad. That, and the sweet scrape of her nails against his scalp when she drew him in for another kiss, all teeth and tongue and hunger. The press of her arms twining about him, pulling him close, her lips, the taste of her, he couldn't get enough. He kept going back for more until he was sure he'd pulled all her air into his lungs, breathed it back, again and again until his head swam for her.

She was breathless when they finally pulled apart. Her cheeks were flushed all the way to her ears but she was smiling that smug little curl of a smile that could usually made him forget all about being mad at her but right now it was only making him harder, more desperate to crush her to him, to feel the sweet warmth of her against his fingers, his mouth, his cock. He groaned against her hair, open-mouthed. His erection was almost painful now, growing harder with every insistent roll of her hips.

He squeezed his eyes shut. Tried for words. Bethany ground down against him with a suddenness that made him swear, eyes shooting open, narrowing in mock anger when she just smiled and rolled her shoulders in that way she had when she knew she'd pulled something over on him. He bucked against her in retaliation. Her head lolled back on her neck he watched the long line of her throat bob when she whimpered, and it was just the prettiest damn thing he'd ever laid eyes on. He had to do it again. So he did, and seized the opportunity to talk while she was distracted. "Bethany," he tried again, mouthing it against the shadow of her throat where he knew a bite would make her squirm. It did, and he allowed himself that small moment of satisfaction before he made himself pull back.

"Bethany, I think," he said, nibbling a line across the sensitive skin beneath her chin, "you're wearing far too many clothes."  
"Oh?" Her voice was a laugh caught in the back of her throat, thin and high and reedy. He dug his teeth in. She made the most delicious sound, so he did it again.

"Yes."

"Then I suppose you'd better do something about it," she said archly, giving that same slow roll of her hips that made his mouth go dry and his thoughts scatter until he could barely remember his own name, let alone what he'd been doing. Clothes. Right.

Piece by piece, he bared her before his gaze. The gloves first, finger by finger, kissing every inch of skin as it was exposed, paying particular attention to the pulse point in her wrist. He bit, lightly, smiling against her skin when she made the most delicious noise, legs tightening round his hips.

Then her breasts. He ran his hands over them lightly, then more firmly, weighing them, squeezing them, marveling again, as he had the first time, as he did every time, at his sister's beauty, at whatever incredible good deeds he must have done in another life that he was permitted to touch her, touch these.

They weren't perfect. One was slightly larger than the other, and they were both crisscrossed with pale scars and paler stripes where the skin had stretched as she'd grown, but they were all he'd ever desired.

He ran his thumb lightly over a nipple, rubbing circles that elicited small sighs. His heart leaped in his throat at every noise of pleasure that fell from Bethany's mouth, thudding in his ears until he was sure she could hear it, but she just leaned back within the circle of his arms, looking down at him through eyes gone half lidded with pleasure as he brought his mouth down to her left breast. He pressed a soft kiss to her nipple. It could almost be called chaste, if he hadn't then opened his lips and swirled his tongue around her nipple, drawing it into his mouth. He darted his tongue from side to side, again and again and again, until her hands had returned to pull at his hair, until her words of encouragement dropped off to soundless little cries. He paused occasionally to suckle and tease with his lips, hollowing out his cheeks, and then he bent back to work, reeling her back in when she made to pull away with a keening whine, only transferring his attentions to her other breast when she started to twitch.

It was done time before he finally let her breast pop out of his mouth, trailing a silver line from his mouth that he ached to lick up the line of her chest. He moved to do so. She put a hand in his chest, pushing him back. "Enough!" She laughed, a little breathlessly. Her eyes were bright.

"Fine, fine, your desires come first, of course." He ducked the swat she aimed at his head with a laugh, and bent to remove her boots. She lifted her hips to wriggle out of her pants, and then she was finally, gloriously naked. He took a moment to drink it in, until she started shifting restlessly under his gaze.

She quieted at the hand in her shoulder, pushing her gently back again the pillows. She went willingly enough, dragging him with her. "If you think you're getting off that easy, you've forgotten more than I thought," she whispered against the shell of his ear, making him shiver.

She spat in the palm of one slim, white hand, and then it was closing around the length of his cock, she was humming something positively filthy against his ear but he could hardly make it out because Bethany was good at this, Bethany was very good. Just the amount of pressure he liked, slow, building, with a twist at the end of the upstroke that made him see stars.  
She was kissing him again, lips moving against his, and he realized she was singing one of the tavern song about him that Isabela had started, the one that took a few liberties with his duel with the Arishok. He laughed incredulously, and her teeth flashed in a grin when she saw he'd caught it.

His own hand dipped into the wiry thatch of curls between her legs, teasing, just touching her lips with the barest hint of pressure before dragging it back down again, then up, over and over and over, driving her nearly mad with desire. Bethany panted, she twisted, she huffed and growled his name and spread her legs wider, a clear hint that she wanted him to go faster, but he stayed where he was, up and down and up, until his sweet sister was wet and dripping, aching for him, until words started to fall from her lips that he knew she must have learned from the wardens, because she sure hadn't known them the last time they'd done this.

Finally, he couldn't stand it anymore and slipped a finger between her slick folds. Bethany's whispered oath to the Maker turned into a curse. After more minutes a second finger joined the first, then a third. The muscles in her legs trembled, twitching with every gasp, every pull of his fingers. He twisted his hand. Keeping his thumb moving across her clit, he arched his first two fingers experimentally, and she gave a scream, clenching down around his fingers in a way that made his cock throb beneath her fingers.

He was too close. Not yet.

He lifted her hand away, moved it to her own breast. She started to tease herself with a ragged whimper. Bethany's hips moved restlessly, fucking herself against his hand.

"Come on, precious," he murmured, staring, unable to look away, entranced by the tremble of her lips, the bounce of her breasts when her back bowed back against the pillows. She was so ducking beautiful. Again, he found himself questioning his luck, his great fortune in having having a sister, a lover, who returned his affections, who didn't avert her gaze in disgust at his touch, but welcomed it, reveled in it. Sometimes he wondered if he truly deserved it, but he had only to look into her eyes to know that it didn't matter what he thought, it mattered what Bethany thought. And she thought he was worth trekking across a blasted city for, worth dropping her guard, her weapons, her arms for. Her heart. "Come for me."

"I'm trying," Bethany whined, hands scrabbling at the sheets. Her skin shine with sweat. Fine droplets dusted the space between her breasts. He bent his head and licked them up, wringing another helpless, frustrated noise out of her.

"If you say so." Her eyes, which had slipped close in her throes, slid open to show a thin gleaming of copper, and he completely forgot what he'd been going to say. Even now, irritated and breathless, she had the power to take his breath away. He swallowed, thickly, recovering. "We'll have to make this a team effort, then, Bethany," he said, tapping the hand in her breast, which had fallen still.

She glared again, but resumed pinching and teasing her nipple until it rounded to a peak. Hawke made not the slightest attempt to hide the naked want in his eyes. He let it burn, setting the center of him aflame.

He quickened the motion of his fingers, bringing up his other hand to cup the back of her neck and squeeze, just there, and then she was coming, jerking up off the bed with a harsh scream.

Only when he'd wrung the last trembling aftershocks from her did he settle himself between her legs. Her arms came up around his shoulders at once, crushing her chest against his, rubbing herself against him with another one of those moans that made him go near lightheaded with his need for her.

His hand shook as he lined himself up. She was shaking too, he could feel it as he started to push in with agonizing slowness, inch by inch, until she was tossing her head from side to side and begging him to go faster, please, until he was gritting his teeth so hard they ached in an effort to maintain control, and pulled out, gripping her hips to keep her in place. His breath was loud in his ears, his whole world narrowed down to the woman between his arms. Her hips arched up off the bed in little jerks, and her lips were moving soundlessly now, beyond words, but he only had to look at her eyes to know the same hunger he knew lay in his. He thrust in again, in one smooth movement that had her breathe out his name in a rush.

"Fuck," he panted, and, "fuck. Fuck. Bethany." It was all he could say at first, until he found his tongue again, until she did. Latched onto it with her lips and teeth and kissed him breathless, and then he had too many words. They came spilling out of him, a flood he couldn't stop if he'd tried, and he didn't want to. Not if it meant he had to stop kissing her, had to stop moving, stop spreading her legs wider so he could watch himself glide in and out of her, caught by the droplets of her slick that spattered the sheets with every thrust. If he stopped now he'd die. "Oh, fuck, Bethany, you feel so good," half a growl half a song, and other things, inane things, that he wanted it to be his face she thought of when she fucked those wardens back at the keep, that he wanted her to come again, needed her to, needed her to scream for him.

Her breath came a series of short, sharp sighs, ripped out of her until they sounded high, sounded a gasp, a helpless rising moan. Her eyes fluttered, rolling up into her head. Small lines of electricity began to arc off her fingers, bringing with them some small amount of pain but he muscled past it, because it was Bethany. Because he knew she didn't mean to hurt him, that she couldn't always control these spontaneous bursts of magic when she let her control slip, and because he knew that, in a moment, the pain would turn to pleasure when she realized, and put more of a mind behind it.

And she did. It did. It started to feel good. Really good. Her right hand dropped from its white-knuckled grip in his hair to where they were joined. He bucked at the sudden wave of pleasure, driving himself against her, into her, mouth falling open in a low groan that came straight up from his belly. He matched him, met him, and they melded together. He lost himself in her, in her eyes, her mouth, the hot, sweet clench of her.

Bethany was beyond words. Every thrust ground her hand against her clit. She was shuddering again, nearing another climax, and he wasn't far behind.

His strokes went erratic, and he knew he was close, could feel it in the hot build behind his eyes, her sweet cries bringing him closer to the brink with every passing second. "B-Bethany." He said something else, then, something more, but he couldn't hear anything over his own panted breaths, the wet slap of skin on skin. He thrust inside her once, twice more, burying himself in her to the hilt, and then he was shaking, gasping with the electric thrill that lanced up from the warm coil at the base of his spine. The world went white.

When he came back to himself he was slumped over her shoulder, face buried in her sweat dampened hair. Bethany's head was tucked beneath his chin. She fit against him perfectly, flush against his chest. He wasn't sure if she was awake or not, and he felt strangely unwilling to break the stillness that had fallen over them to look.

In a moment, he would open his eyes and it would be time for her to go back to her armor and her oaths and the lovers she was sure she had, there across the sea. That clench behind his ribs had become an icy fist.

In a moment he would have to stop pretending that this was his life, that she was, that he would fall asleep between her arms every night wake between her legs, or any combination thereof, that she was his and he was hers, the way it'd used to be.

But not yet.


End file.
